Featured Research

from universities, journals, and other organizations

More than just baby blues: How postpartum depression arises and how it could be prevented

Date:

June 20, 2010

Source:

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft

Summary:

Within the first week after giving birth, up to 70 percent of all women experience symptoms of the baby blues. While most women recover quickly, up to 13 percent of all new mothers suffer from symptoms of a clinical-level postpartum depression.

Share This

Monoamine model of postpartum blues. A: After delivery, estrogen levels drop 100- to 1000fold; the estrogen decline is greatest during the first 3 to 4 days postpartum, with a modest decline thereafter. B: Monoamine oxidase A (MAO-A) levels are significantly greater in the early postpartum period, with a peak on day 5 postpartum. C: In the early postpartum period, up to 70% of mothers experience sadness, mood lability, anxiety, insomnia, poor appetite, and irritability, with mood being lowest on day 5 postpartum.

Within the first week after giving birth, up to 70 percent of all women experience symptoms of the baby blues. While most women recover quickly, up to 13 percent of all new mothers suffer from symptoms of a clinical-level postpartum depression.

Related Articles

Postpartum depression is defined as a major depressive episode starting within 4 weeks after delivery and is a significant public health problem. Postpartum blues represents a major risk factor for developing postpartum depression and severe postpartum blues symptoms can be viewed as a prodromal stage for postpartum depression.

Julia Sacher from the MPI for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig and her colleague Jeffrey H. Meyer from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, Canada, could now reveal an increase of the enzyme MAO-A throughout the female brain in the immediate postpartum period and propose a novel, neurobiological model for postpartum blues

The research appears in the Archives of General Psychiatry (May 26, 2010).

For most women, the birth of their baby is one of the most strenuous but also happiest days in their lives. So it is very difficult to understand why almost three-quarters of all women feel down shortly after giving birth. They can suffer from extreme sadness, mood swings, anxiety, sleeplessness, loss of appetite, and irritability. For a long time, the reasons for this have been unclear. What has been known is that in the first three to four days after giving birth, estrogen levels drop 100 to 1000 fold.

In the current study researchers have discovered that proportional to this estrogen-loss, levels of the enzyme monoamine oxidase A (MAO-A) increase dramatically throughout the female brain. The enzyme can be found in higher concentrations in glial cells and monoamine-releasing neurons, where it breaks down the neurotransmitters serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine. As well as being responsible for transmitting signals between nerve cells, these neurotransmitters also influence our mood. If they are deficient, we initially feel sad, and later have a high risk of becoming depressed.

Using positron emission tomography (PET) -- an imaging method that creates images of the distribution of a short-lived radioactive substance in an organism -- the researchers measured the distribution of a radioactively- marked ligand in the brain which binds specifically and with a high affinity to the enzyme monoamine oxidase A. They found that levels of MAO-A were, on average, 43 percent higher in women who had just had a baby than in a control group consisting of women who either had children a long time ago or had no children. The MAO-A increase could be shown in all brain regions investigated, with MAO-A levels being highest on day five postpartum. This result fits neatly with the fact that the mood of mothers often hits a low precisely on this day.

Severe baby blues symptoms can be viewed as a prodromal stage for postpartum depression. From this perspective, preventing depressive symptoms in the immediate postpartum period may have powerful impact for prophylaxis of postpartum depression. Attempts can be made to either lower elevated levels of MAO-A with selected antagonist drugs, or to increase the concentration of monoamine neurotransmitters that can elevate mood. Both have the goal of keeping levels of monoamine neurotransmitters in the brain balanced after birth. Given the need to develop treatments that are compatible with breastfeeding, the intake of dietary supplements of monoamine precursors in the early postpartum period would be a promising strategy to maintain a sufficient balance of monoamines during this time. This includes the administration of precursor supplements such as the amino acids tryptophan and tyrosine, which the body can convert into the neurotransmitters serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine, respectively.

"Our results have the exciting potential for prevention for severe postpartum blues. This could have an impact on prevention and treatment of postpartum depression in the future," says Julia Sacher, first author of the study.

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft. "More than just baby blues: How postpartum depression arises and how it could be prevented." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 20 June 2010. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100616102854.htm>.

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft. (2010, June 20). More than just baby blues: How postpartum depression arises and how it could be prevented. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 31, 2015 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100616102854.htm

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft. "More than just baby blues: How postpartum depression arises and how it could be prevented." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100616102854.htm (accessed March 31, 2015).

More From ScienceDaily

More Mind & Brain News

Featured Research

Mar. 31, 2015 — Children who get a taste of their parents' wine now and then may be more likely than their peers to start drinking by high school, according to a new report. The findings are based on 561 Rhode ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — Neuroscientists are taking inspiration from natural motor control to design new prosthetic devices that can better replace limb function. Researchers have tested a range of brain-controlled devices ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — Speaking in public is the top fear for many people. Now, researchers have developed an intelligent user interface for 'smart glasses' that gives real-time feedback to the speaker on volume modulation ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — To help scientists make sense of 'brain big data,' researchers have used data mining to create www.neuroelectro.org, a publicly available website that acts like Wikipedia, indexing physiological ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — The moon does not influence the timing of human births or hospital admissions, a new study finds, confirming what astronomers have known for decades. The study illustrates how intelligent people ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — An estimated eight million adults in the U.S. suffer from binge eating disorder. Now, researchers have shown that compulsive binging on foods that are high in fat and sugar can trigger specific ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — New estimates suggest that 20 to 30 percent of opioid analgesic drugs prescribed for chronic pain are misused, while the rate of opioid addiction is approximately 10 percent. "On average, misuse was ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — A link between inflammation and depression, which affects approximately 148 million people in the United States, has been identified by researchers. A new study finds that resveratrol -- a natural ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015 — There are electrical signals in the nervous system, the brain and throughout the human body and there are tiny magnetic fields associated with these signals that could be important for medical ... full story

Featured Videos

AAA: Distracted Driving a Serious Teen Problem

AP (Mar. 25, 2015) — While distracted driving is not a new problem for teens, new research from the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety says it&apos;s much more serious than previously thought. (March 25)
Video provided by AP

Many Don't Know They Have Alzheimer's, But Their Doctors Do

Newsy (Mar. 24, 2015) — According to a new study by the Alzheimer&apos;s Association, more than half of those who have the degenerative brain disease aren&apos;t told by their doctors.
Video provided by Newsy

A Quick 45-Minute Nap Can Improve Your Memory

Newsy (Mar. 23, 2015) — Researchers found those who napped for 45 minutes to an hour before being tested on information recalled it five times better than those who didn&apos;t.
Video provided by Newsy

Related Stories

July 31, 2014 — Postpartum mood swings are correlated with high monoamine oxidase A binding, a study shows. For most women, the birth of their baby is one of the most strenuous but also happiest days in their lives. ... full story

Jan. 3, 2014 — Expectant women with prenatally diagnosed fear of childbirth are at an increased risk of postpartum depression, according to a study of over 500,000 mothers in Finland. Women with a history of ... full story

July 19, 2011 — Women who have breastfeeding difficulties in the first two weeks after giving birth are more likely to suffer postpartum depression two months later compared to women without such difficulties, ... full story

June 20, 2011 — Women with urinary incontinence after giving birth are almost twice as likely to develop postpartum depression as those without incontinence. Health professionals should be proactive and ask women ... full story

May 4, 2010 — Greater levels of a brain protein called monoamine oxidase A (MAO-A) may explain why postpartum blues and clinical depression are so common after childbirth, according to a new ... full story

ScienceDaily features breaking news and videos about the latest discoveries in health, technology, the environment, and more -- from major news services and leading universities, scientific journals, and research organizations.